Waitangi Day is a New Zealand holiday that commemorates the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840. This Treaty of Waitangi was signed by the British Empire and the Maori people (indifenous Polynesian people of New Zealand) on the 6th of February in 1840 and is referred to as the founding document of New Zealand. Waitangi Day was celebrated for the first official time in 1934 and became a public holiday in 1974.